Pay salaries immediately: VMC union

DWCUA, CMEY group members and contract employees working for Vijayawada Municipal Corporation, seek alms from a street vendor as part of their protest in front of VMC office on Wednesday. Photo: V. Raju

Municipal Corporation Workers Union, affiliated to CPI(M), has staged a protest in front of Vijayawada Municipal Corporation office demanding that the corporation pay the wages of sanitary and contract workers immediately. The workers sought alms from passersby to demonstrate that they had to rely on begging to eke out livelihood.

CPI (M) city secretary Ch. Babu Rao, addressing the gathering on Wednesday, said that the VMC had not paid wages of DWCUA, CMEY group members for the last two months. The contract workers working in vehicle depot were not paid for the last four months. The employees working at swimming pools on contract basis have not received salaries for the last 10 months. Though the VMC had deducted Rs. 17 crore towards PF and ESI etc. from the salaries, it had not remitted to the respective organisations, he pointed out.

Union general secretary M. David said that they had submitted a memorandum to the Municipal Commissioner urging him to take necessary steps to pay the salaries.

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National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) organised a mock demonstration on ways to rescue people drowning in River Krishna in the presence of its Director General O.P. Singh at Seethanagaram in Guntur District on Tuesday. The Hindu photographer V. Raju captures the action.